Ever since I’ve been aware of Piers Corbyn I’ve found him extremely confusing. Simply because what he says is so at odds with what we know in science, and because he’s very secretive about how arrives at his conclusions.

What I’m referring to are the weather predictions he makes via his company WeatherAction. What his company does is make long-term weather forecasts based on solar activity, the earth’s magnetic field, and the moon’s orbit. He calls it the Solar-Lunar-Action-Technique, or SLAT for short. He claims he gets a high rate of success with this technique and can predict the weather up to a year in advance; but I’m not convinced.

The problem is that what he uses for his predictions, like the sun, has at best a minor effect on weather and our climate. This is well known in the scientific community, yet he claims it has a big effect. But it’s also Corbyn that claims this high accuracy, there’s actually very little out there that hints at there being any skill to his predictions.

His predictions are also extremely vague, like forecasting heavy rain. Which leaves you to wonder how much rain would mean a successful forecast. It’s vague predictions like this why most people ignore Corbyn, but it doesn’t stop some folks from taking a look at how skilful his predictions are. Suffice to say that almost always his predictions are wrong. Which makes him mostly irrelevant to the field of weather forecasting.

But he is sometimes mentioned by climate science deniers as Corbyn also comments on global warming via his company (from the homepage of WeatherAction, archived here):

WeatherAction is involved in the Global Warming /Climate Change debate where we point out that the world is now cooling not warming and there is no observational evidence in the thousands and millions of years of data that changes in CO2 have any effect on weather or climate. There are no scientists in the world who can produce such observational data.

Bold statement when we know the planet isn’t cooling and we have mountains of evidence of how CO2 either causes or amplifies a change in temperature. It ignores the very basic finding that CO2 traps heat, something you can measure in a laboratory. It doesn’t matter if these changes in temperature were directly observed or not. By the same logic a criminal didn’t murder someone because there are no witnesses, despite other evidence showing this being the case.

This report and the build-up to it is a carefully choreographed self-referencing political game by Climate Change parasites which contains nothing of substance and is constructed to conceal the facts.

Lovely language, but it again ignores reality. For one it’s not a “self-referencing political game” as the report by the IPCC cites over 9,000 scientific reports for their latest release. But lets see what Corbyn provides to support this statement:

ALL THE DIRE PREDICTIONS of the CO2 warmists since 2000 have failed.

No, they haven’t. As the IPCC isn’t in the business of making predictions, they make projections. These projections give a range of what we might expect in a certain period, they don’t predict what the climate will be in one specific year. Also so far the IPCC projections have proven to be very accurate.

THE “ADMISSION” of a ‘a pause in warming’ over the last 15 years is itself a cover-up for the fact that ONLY THEIR FRAUDULENT DATA shows any ‘warming’ at all in the period.

It’s not their data, the IPCC uses temperature datasets that others created; one of them being HadCRUT. If you use the Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator you’ll notice that HadCRUT, GISTEMP, NOAA, BEST (land only) and UAH (satellite) all show warming. The only exception being the RSS satellite temperature dataset.

But all that is besides the point, what he did was cherry picking. His start year is 1998 which was an exceptionally strong El Niño year, that alone will influence the temperature trend line for such a short period. Considering he’s in the long-term weather prediction business he should know this.

THEIR CLAIM that this pause was “something we (CO2 warmists) expected” is a brazen lie. They expected ‘runaway warming’

Yes, periods for which there is a lower warming trend of the surface temperature record aren’t exactly a surprise when they happen. It has happened before, so it will happen again. The IPCC also never projected runaway warming in their reports.

THEIR STATEMENT that the world has warmed over the last 30 years or so is merely an expression of the natural solar-lunar 60yr cycle of temperatures (and Pacific circulation) explained by WeatherAction in 2008 and nothing to do with CO2.

Utter nonsense, the sun has nothing to do with the rise in temperature:

The oceans also cannot cause warming in the atmosphere and gain heat at the same time. Something has to be putting more energy into our climate for that to have any effect, as without more energy the long-term trend would be zero.

And I’m not even going to bother addressing the claim of the moon influencing global temperatures as there isn’t a link.

THEIR CLAIM that alleged CO2 warming due to a small rise in the atmospheric concentration (0.04%) of the trace gas, CO2, is somehow hidden in the deep ocean is scientific cretinism beyond reason, fact or observation.

Something being a small part of the atmosphere doesn’t mean it can’t have a big effect. Atmospheric concentrations CFCs are measured in the parts per trillion, CO2 is measure in parts per million. Yet CFCs are responsible for the hole in the ozone layer.

Also the claim that the warming is going into the deep ocean isn’t “scientific cretinism beyond reason, fact or observation” because it is factual as it’s what we’re measuring:

THE CO2 “theory” has no predictive powers in weather or climate and while all it’s dire warnings have failed and it’s supposed scientific basis has been shown to be lacking the prognoses of the EVIDENCE-BASED Solar-Lunar science of WeatherAction and others over the last 7 years have been vindicated.

Again quite removed from reality as this isn’t an accurate reflection of what the IPCC claims and what’s in the scientific literature. But I’ve come to expect these kinds of non-factual statements from Corbyn.

So when he closes with this (exact quote from his website, I didn’t alter it):

IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE THE UN IPCC and all it stands for must be destroyed.

I can only say that I disagree with him. First he needs to show that he actually has a point and doesn’t ignore scientific findings before he can make such a bold statement and expect to be taking serious.

17 reader comments

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You state “there’s actually very little out there that hints at there being any skill to his predictions”.

I carried out a 6-month analysis of Piers Corbyn’s weather forecasts from May-October 2012. I did this in order to establish whether his climate change views could have any validity; if his weather forecasts were any good then it would give him the necessary credibility. I found his forecasts to be in the region of 70% successful, though you would have to read my analysis to ascertain my methodology and reasoning behind this figure, and how I address the issue of his forecasts being vague.

He predicted two storms, around the 21st/22nd September and again in November (not analysed on my spreadsheet but I kept a close eye on it) with amazing accuracy in both timing and substance. There is simply no way he could have done that by guessing.

I have concluded that there is significant skill to his predictions.

You also state “The problem is that what he uses for his predictions, like the sun, has at best a minor effect on weather and our climate.”

That’s because there are, as far as I can determine, two elements to his forecasting that are not understood by standard meteorology: the gravity of the moon pulling the jet stream, and solar magnetic particles which ionise the lower atmosphere and influence cloud cover, and which are in turn influenced by the gravity of the moon (his Solar/Lunar technique). Piers Corbyn is not the only person who has identified some of these elements (as my website points out) though Corbyn seems to be well ahead of everyone else. I don’t fully understand it myself but I believe I’m on the right lines in attempting to figure out the basics of the Solar/Lunar technique. Corbyn has stated that solar magnetic particles carry many times more energy that direct solar radiation and have a much bigger influence on the climate than just how hot the sun appears.

Whether his demonstrable long-range forecasting success means his global warming views are also correct is not a given, but I believe he has earned credibility enough to be taken seriously by virtue of this success.

I find that people generally come to an issue with a pre-determined agenda and are not usually interested in having their minds changed by looking at evidence. This applies to Piers Corbyn supporters and detractors alike. I have attempted to cut through the c**p and actually find out once and for all whether Corbyn should be taken seriously. I have concluded that yes, he should be.

I am interested in left-leaning politics & economics, artistic analysis and the environment (though not from a ‘green’ perspective as such). I am particularly interested in trying to identify ‘truths’ in subject areas that have highly charged opinions on both sides, such as Piers Corbyn’s weather forecasts.

Thank you.

Moderation remarkShow

I just noticed you think crop circles are made by aliens:

As a side issue I wish to point out the hypocracy of the established view on crop circles. These have been observed for decades, possibly even hundreds of years. Skeptics say they are simply made by people for fun. And yet no one has ever been caught and prosecuted for the criminal damage that they are. They are made in the middle of summer (when crops are fully grown) which means during very short nights, at least in Britain. Why has a farmer never been woken by hoaxers trespassing on their land? Many crops are harvested at night and farmers often work all hours of the day. Could it be possible for hoaxers to produce such beautiful and eloboarate creations without using a source of light? In which case why have they not been observed doing it?

Even after people showing how they are made? And the fact that the more complex crop circles are made during multiple nights? After this I can't take you serious any more.

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Yes, there’s very little out there that suggests any skill to his predictions. Especially since Corbyn doesn’t like others analysing his predictions and him not writing any peer-reviewed articles that explains his methodology and how it works.

I’ve read your document and it suffers from the same problem as Corbyn’s predictions: it’s vague. You don’t show exactly what he predicted, what the exact weather conditions were, how exactly you count something as a success based on that (you also count ‘close’ as a success). You also skim over how all this is used to determine if he got it right just by chance or if he is just simply using probability estimates.

But here’s the part that I have the biggest problem with:

Sometimes he doesn’t translate this general weather scenario into an accurate weather forecast for specific areas, because his forecasts for the position of areas of high and low pressure are slightly different from his forecasts resulting in weather that is markedly different.

And later on you expand on that with this:

Sometimes the general pressure forecast is not necessarily translated into an accurate weather forecast. This mismatch is usually due to the pressure scenarios that occur being slightly different from forecast, resulting in the weather being markedly different from forecast. On some occasions he got the pressure scenario correct but still forecast the wrong weather, which may suggest a lack of meteorological expertise which could be rectified by working with professionals in the field.

Sorry, but getting the weather wrong is exactly the my point. He’s in the business of weather predictions and getting that wrong doesn’t bode well for his prediction capabilities. And that is with me assuming you are correct about him getting pressure areas correct.

Also the moon does pull on the atmosphere, but that effect is extremely small compared to the daily heating of our atmosphere by the sun. The Coriolis effect and temperature gradients are far stronger forces that act on the jet stream.

Another detail is that “solar magnetic particles” are influenced by our planets magnetic field, you need a very strong solar storm before they reach beyond the north and south poles. Him stating that “that solar magnetic particles carry many times more energy that direct solar radiation and have a much bigger influence on the climate than just how hot the sun appears [sic]” is something he needs to explain how it works. Otherwise it’s just an unsubstantiated claim.

I also have issues with taking you seriously because you say this:

Corbyn should be allowed to debate his ideas on the impact of CO2 in a public forum with climate change scientists in order to ‘clear the air’ and remove the scepticism that many in the business have with Corbyn. If he is wrong then it ought to be easy to demonstrate by climate change experts.

In the above blog post I already gave some of the evidence that shows that he’s flat out wrong with his statements on CO2 and climate change. There’s no point in debating someone who has ideas that have no merit.

Re Piers Corbyn – I count “close” as a success because that’s all that Corbyn claims to do. He doesn’t claim to produce bang on accurate forecasts, just a general picture, but his long-range forecasts are way more detailed than the UK Met Office manages to do – theirs are a joke.

I had thought about putting Corbyn’s forecasts for those months on my website but wasn’t sure if he would allow it, perhaps I will so you can check my spreadsheet.

My point about air pressure / weather anomolies is what I have found. For example, last week he forecast wet/windy for Scotland and dry for South East England. It was the opposite. An area of low pressure materialised across the British isles as he predicted but was a couple of hundred miles out of place from the prediction. So, 8/10 for pressure and 0/10 for weather. He general weather forecasts are very good. A fine, summery start to October, followed by very wet weather after the first week – spot on!

As for moon tidal effects / solar effects etc, fine, but the fact is that Corbyn’s method really does work and something must be out there to explain it.

Considering that Corbyn operates on a shoestring budget and the UK Met Office has a turnover of £20m I think Corbyn does very well.

Many leading UK policitians are secret Corbyn supporters, such as London Mayor (and potential PM) Boris Johnson. A meteorologist and weather presented, Paul Hudson, is too.

Moderation remarkShow

What I gave in the previous moderation remark was just an example of why I have trouble taking you serious. I will not give a platform to demonstrably wrong claims about UFOs or crop circles. See this wikipedia article for an introduction as to why.

You cannot use the accuracy or detail of the Met Office long term projections to argue that Corbyn is better (it doesn’t tell you anything about how good his predictions are). For one the Met is aware of the limitations of their methods which is largely in part due to knowledge, data, and computational restrictions. Earth’s weather is very chaotic (not using the colloquial term here) which makes it extremely hard to give accurate predictions.

Corbyn faces this same problem as the MET office. That’s why I have such an issue with vague predictions which you then again give a margin of error. This artificially raises his success rate. And you do this without knowing how he predicts, if it works, and if it works why it works. You also don’t give a good direct comparison with what he predicted and what the actual weather predictions were.

For example you giving Corbyn an 8/10 for a low pressure zone ” a couple of hundred miles out of place from the prediction” I do not find credible.That’s at the least 200 to 300 miles from where he predicted it. That can put this low pressure zone on the west coast of the Great Britain instead of on the east coast. In the case of my country the Netherlands this could place the low pressure zone in France instead of above my country. That’s a fail for his weather predictions (it also doesn’t tell you if it was a deviation, he got some of the development correct, or that it was just pure chance).

That’s why I think you don’t have a point when you say that Corbyn’s method “does work and something must be out there to explain it”. There are too many errors and vague predictions to make such a definite statement. A hint that there might be something to his method is just the first step. The next step is explaining how it works and why it works. After that we can have a good talk about the merits of his predictions. But so far Corbyn hasn’t offered this and neither have you.

I also wouldn’t recommend publishing his predictions without his permission as he has threatened to sue people who did this.

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Areas of low pressure can be up to several hundred miles across so getting it 200 miles out isn’t altogether a failure. As I state clearly he often gets the pressure forecast slightly out which results in the weather being totally out, but despite this he still gets the weather around 70% accurate if you take “close” as being a success. Piers himself does NOT claim to be accurate to the day, nor does he claim to be anything more than “generally correct”; therefore I believe that “close” is conforming to the claims made by Piers and is a fair assessment. He states at the top of his forecasts “6 out of 8 period in the month will be basically correct”. That’s all – not ” I can tell you 100% if it’s going to rain to the day and I will always get it right”. HE only claims to be “close” therefore I counted “close” as a success.

Reducing Corbyn’s forecasts to numbers is fraught with ambiguity but at least I’ve made a go at it. I’m sure that if you subscribed to his forecasts for 6 months and did a similar analysis then you would conclude much the same as I have – the fact is that he has a statistically verifiable skill in forecasting general weather patterns into the future. Not always translated into accurate weather but his success in general pressure and jet stream forecasting would become apparent.

Whether it follows that he’s also right about global warming is something I haven’t commented on because I don’t know his methods; nevertheless his skill in weather forecasting means he deserves to be taken seriously and argued with.

you do this without knowing how he predicts, if it works, and if it works why it works. You also don’t give a good direct comparison with what he predicted and what the actual weather predictions were.

For example you giving Corbyn an 8/10 for a low pressure zone ” a couple of hundred miles out of place from the prediction” I do not find credible.That’s at the least 200 to 300 miles from where he predicted it. That can put this low pressure zone on the west coast of the Great Britain instead of on the east coast. In the case of my country the Netherlands this could place the low pressure zone in France instead of above my country. That’s a fail for his weather predictions (it also doesn’t tell you if it was a deviation, he got some of the development correct, or that it was just pure chance).

I’m not asking for 100% accuracy. What I’m pointing out is that there are enormous uncertainties in what you do with your comparisons. Pay close attention to what I say between the parentheses .

I also won’t buy a subscription for the following reasons:

1) I don’t have the money for that.
2) I’m not going to fund someone who denies basic physics (his climate science denial).
3) Analysing his work takes a lot of time, which I don’t have (done something similar once with ‘Climate Changes, But Facts Don’t: Debunking Monckton‘. I’m not doing that again).

I’m also not going to take Corbyn serious on his statements on global warming; they are wrong. Just from the basic physics that are involved. I talk about why this is in the above post and link to supplementary materials. Someone who rejects the position of experts and the evidence they base their position on isn’t credible on the subject.

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Just listened to Corbyn on Infowars.com radio.He sounds vague & amateurish.Surprised Alex Jones is gullible enough to take all that junk.Can’t believe Corbyn actually charges for forecasts!Surely nobody actually PAYS for his forecasts do they!Well,they do say there’s one born every minute.

Alex Jones is a conspiracy theorist who doesn’t shown any signs of critical thinking. Almost always what he says has no basis in reality or he mangles what he uses for his argument. It very obviously shows with who he invites as guests.

It also reflects badly on Corbyn that he would want to appear on infowars. As infowars is in the business of misinforming people and you shouldn’t add to it or give them any credibility.

Collin Maessen is the founder and editor of Real Skeptic and a proponent of scientific skepticism. For his content he uses the most up to date and best research as possible. Where necessary consulting or collaborating with scientists.

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The goal of Real Skeptic is to take a critical look at scientific claims and investigate what the scientific literature and experts say about it. As skepticism doesn’t start with the viewpoints and claims of others, and being skeptical about those does not make you a skeptic. Being a skeptic starts with examining your own viewpoints, the positions you hold, and the claims you make.